Since its establishment, the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev has been crucial in developing Israel’s South. After October 7, its expertise will be instrumental in rebuilding and strengthening the region, the university’s president, Prof. Daniel Chamovitz, highlighted, speaking at the Jerusalem Post’s Israel Summit.
“In the 1960s, David Ben-Gurion envisioned a Hebrew Oxford in the Negev, at a point where, in Beersheba, there were more camels than people,” Chamovitz said. “Ben-Gurion University is arguably the most important university for the development of Israel if you believe that the Negev is necessary for the future of our country.”
The university has been directly affected by the massacre carried out by Hamas and the ensuing war.
“We have had over 95 casualties, and one of our students is still held hostage in Gaza,” Chamovitz noted. “Hundreds of our students and employees have been displaced.”
The university immediately took action to provide financial relief to those in need without waiting for the government to determine its own policies.
“We took immediate responsibility for our people,” Chamovitz said.
The university also saw as many as 6,000 students and faculty called up for service, about a third of its student body.“Now it is down to around 3,500, and hopefully, we will get most of them back soon,” the professor said.
Also in this case, the university has been working to meet these students’ needs, providing private tutoring and scheduling additional courses in the upcoming summer.
“Our commitment is that no one will be left behind because of their reserve duty,” highlighted Chamovitz.
According to BGU’s president, the recent spike in antisemitism on US campuses, as well as the questionable answers on the topic provided by the leaders of some of the most prestigious universities, represent a clear opportunity for American students to realize that pursuing their higher education in Israel gives them everything they would have gotten in America but in a place where they can fully embrace their Jewish identity and at a fraction of the cost.Chamovitz described the past few weeks as a “watershed moment.”
“My only hope is that this unfortunate incident might cause the pendulum to start swinging back the other way to some type of sanity on campuses,” he said.
Meanwhile, Ben-Gurion University is working on the next phase of its mission.
“We are holding discussions to understand our role in the rebuilding of the Negev,” Chamovitz said, highlighting that the endeavor will be “dependent on the expertise that will come out of Ben-Gurion University, whether in the field of urban planning, sustainability, tourism, medicine, mental health, or all the other areas.”